TSV Converter
FileFlip converts TSV files into 5 other formats entirely inside your browser, using the text engine compiled to WebAssembly. The TSV file is never uploaded to a server: it is read off your disk, converted on your own machine, and saved back by the browser. There is no file-size limit and no account to create.
How do I convert a TSV file?#
- Drop your TSV file onto the converter at the top of this page, or click it to pick one from your computer.
- Choose the format you want out of it. FileFlip downloads the engine that conversion needs, once, and your browser caches it.
- Conversion starts the moment you pick the format, and the result is yours to download. The work happens in this tab, so nothing is uploaded and nothing is queued.
Is it safe to convert TSV files online?#
Yes, because nothing is uploaded. FileFlip converts TSV files inside the browser tab you already have open, using WebAssembly builds of the same engines a desktop converter would install. Your file is read from your own disk into the page's memory, and no request carrying it is ever made.
You do not have to take that on trust. Open your browser's network panel, run a conversion, and you will see the engine come down and your file go nowhere. There is no upload, no server-side copy, no retention window, and no account tied to what you converted.
How FileFlip works lists every engine, its version and its download size, and shows how to check for yourself that nothing leaves your machine.
What happens to a TSV file#
FileFlip converts TSV into 5 formats with the text engine, all of it inside the browser tab. Each conversion below names the engine it uses, what it downloads, and exactly what that conversion keeps or drops.
| Category | Data Files |
|---|---|
| File extension | .tsv |
| FileFlip support | Read and written |
| Conversions available | 5 |
| Engines | the text engine |
| Downloaded to your browser | Nothing. Your browser already has everything these conversions need |
What is a TSV file?#
A TSV file holds a table as one line of text per row, with values separated by tab characters instead of the commas CSV uses.
Use TSV instead of CSV when the data itself might contain commas, since tabs are rare enough in real text that quoting is usually unnecessary.
Convert TSV to CSV when the destination tool defaults to comma parsing and doesn't offer a delimiter option.
The TSV file format reference covers the specification, the programs that open one, and what each conversion keeps or drops.
TSV questions people ask#
What's the difference between TSV and CSV?
TSV separates values with a tab character instead of the comma CSV uses. Because tabs almost never appear inside ordinary text, TSV files usually need no quoting at all, while CSV has to wrap any value containing a comma in double quotes.
Is there an official TSV specification?
No. TSV has only an informal IANA media type registration, text/tab-separated-values, submitted by the University of Minnesota's Internet Gopher team in 1993, and it leaves details like how to escape a literal tab inside a value unspecified. Different tools handle that case differently, which is the same gap CSV has with RFC 4180, just with less documentation around it.
Does converting TSV to CSV lose any data?
Not usually, as long as none of the values already contain a comma. If a value does contain a comma, the converter has to wrap it in double quotes to keep the row from splitting incorrectly, which TSV's tab delimiter never required in the first place.